Finding “Just Right”: the Organizational Goldilocks Zone

For collaboration and innovation, the Boston College Libraries is just right.

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“When Goldilocks went into the home of the three bears, she found that some things were too hot, too cold, too hard, or too soft. But in the middle, things were just right”: the Goldilocks Zone.

The phrase has been widely used in astrophysics and astrobiology in the search for life beyond earth, trying to identify exoplanets that could support life as we know it. Such planets would orbit their suns in a zone that supports liquid water, the building block of organic life, in an area not too hot or cold, but just right for life to thrive, like earth.

Parenthetically, my own current interpretation of this theory is really that we are searching for places where DNA can survive, and that in many respects DNA is actually God’s fingerprint for life, in all its forms. My best guess is that the universe is replete with DNA, and as such, life is probably ubiquitous, and the sum is far greater than the parts.

But although the Goldilocks Zone has been adopted in science, organizations have been slow to realize its implications for their own work. I submit, however, that Boston College generally, and the Libraries in particular reside in an ideal space because of the confluence of factors that allow our University to thrive in innovative ways, without losing our unique identity or mission-based focus.

Based on my experiences in other research libraries, and among colleagues in the Association of Research Libraries, I am continually assured that Boston College is in a sweet spot that allows for big dreams, where anything is theoretically possible, but small enough that we know each other and relationships are meaningful and guided by our common mission.

In fact, BC has been seen as an innovator within the ARL community, through creative spaces, emergent programs (digital scholarship), the engagement of our Burns special collections in undergraduate education, and our organizational culture that strives for inclusion and cross-departmental collaboration on initiatives. In that sense, all parts are essential for the success of the whole. No positions, or people within the BC Libraries are any less important than any other. We are in this together, and we will rise and fall as one.

Among the initiatives that being the right size enables is a horizontally integrated organization. Many large organizations, and libraries in particular, remain in organizational silos. In some sense, silos create a manageable structure. But in my mind, they are intrinsically sterile and predictable. Instead, by being in the Goldilocks Zone, we have been able to engage all our department heads in a coherent decision-making body that intentionally examines how the work in disparate areas is related, and supports open discussion around all decisions. In this way, we make the complexity of our research library as transparent as possible by building trust, appreciation, and understanding across departments. Likewise, when we have an idea that we want to pursue, we involve staff from different departments in teasing out the idea further, before it is vetted by the larger department head group. It may seem bureaucratic, but in fact we are more efficient because we are not too big and cumbersome.

I am grateful that the BC Libraries’ culture represents a microcosm of the larger Goldilocks phenomenon that BC embodies. We are active and willing collaborators, and leaders as appropriate. We are not bigger than the whole, but are essential to the vibrant ecosystem that is BC. It’s an environment where everyone can feel recognized, valued, and that their work and ideas are utilized in the larger mission of “Ever to Excel.”

Boston College remains special for a variety for reasons, but this brief essay is simply a reminder that we are in a Goldilocks place, of being not too big, not too small, where anything is possible, and we all can appreciate how our respective roles fit together, guided by a mission that we can all believe in and support. To be part of this community is to understand that faith, service and knowledge represent something bigger than ourselves, and by sharing this realization we are collectively full of life, with fertile ground for ideas and growth, and the ongoing formation of our students, and ourselves; Boston College, thriving within the ideal organizational ecosystem, our Goldilocks Zone.

Wishing you all a productive and restful summer.

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